Howard Meade Rowe 1881-1941

I learned a little bit more about my maternal grandfather this week. I actually found his obituary. It told me things I did not know, but also teased me with more tiny snippits of partial info.

I did not know where he and Granny were living when he died. However, they are both buried in Spencer, NY, in the Fisher/Rowe family plot.

Friend Diane was able to look up the 1940 census info and determine that they were living in Hamilton, NY, in 1941. I only knew the year of his death. However, none of the papers in Tioga or Madison County carried an obituary.

So I took my searches in another direction. I knew that he was a lawyer, so I added that to the search. Up came his obituary in the New York Times, of all things! I'm not totally surprised. I knew that was where he practiced law for a number of years, particularly when my mom was in high school. And then I had to find a friend with a NYT subscription to get me a copy of the page.

But the obit tells me that in addition to being a NY City lawyer, he was an official of the Nestle Food Company and also of Fort Schuyler Farms of Utica, NY. I think this is an error, and it should say Fort Schuyler Club, an exclusive private club founded in 1883. I knew that he had quite a lot of prestige, and Granny was very proud of that. Date of death, March 14, 1941.

Here is another picture I've shared before of Howard in 1911 with Jacques on the left and Catherine (Mom) on the right, ages 4 and 2.

He was born in Norway, Maine. I've always known that, but I didn't realize the Rowe family is fairly prominent there. I found a news clipping from 1903 where a Mrs. and Miss Rowe were guests at ex-governor Perham's home. I suspect the Mrs. Rowe was Howard's mother Annie- see link below for a picture of her in her last year of life. The Miss Rowe might have been his sister Helen.

And this suggests a few more explanations. Annie's mother was a Perham. So they were probably related to the governor. And somewhere among my many boxes and trunks is a dress that was supposedly worn by someone to Governor Perham's innaugural ball. So that begins to make some sense.

This search was brought on by my reading a novel where someone finds out, shockingly, that an aunt committed suicide. Since, sadly, that was how Howard died, it made me newly curious.

I went to my appointments today on the correct day! Did errands, tried a new recipe. Didn't sleep much last night. May have to go lie down soon.

See How Far Back Can You Go?

111 on 11-11

  Some years, on November 11, I post about the fact that it is my Mom's birthday. This year has to be one of those. She would be 111 years old today. That's a lot of ones.

I thought I'd hunt up a picture of her that you haven't seen before. In fact, I found a rather unusual one. There aren't many pictures of her father (Howard Meade Rowe), particularly not with his children. As far as I know, he was a fine father, but I think most pictures of that era were more likely of children with their mothers.

At any rate, this is taken on a beach (on an apparently cold day) in New Jersey in- are you ready for this?- 1911. Lots of elevens floating around here.

The child on the left is not me slipped through a time warp, although I'm a doppelganger for Jacques (Merrill). Mom, Catherine, is on the right. It was a little weird looking through that album. Jacques was first born, and there are lots of pictures of him. I kept seeing myself, only in the wrong era. We really do look alike.

At any rate, this is a nice picture to honor Mom. She always said she got along better with Howard, her father, than with her mother. He was dead before I was born, so I never knew him.

In other news: I was going to goof off today, but I did some stuff anyway. I wrote 577 words. Omer and I went out to take advantage of his free veteran's meal. Then I had to deal with some of the mess generated by my trying to find something yesterday. The mice have been into yet another pile of things I cared about, so that had to be cleaned up. I bought a plastic box to hold what's left. Now I've discovered the box is broken, so that has to be returned. The errands never end. Anyway, I've been sorting through quite a bit of nostalgic stuff. Perhaps you'll see some of it in days to come.

See A Veteran's Day Story

On Mom's Dresser

 
I've been sorting. Don't even ask how it's going. The house looks like a disaster area (more than usual), but the hope is that when it's put back together there will be a little less junk, and a few more things that go together will be located together. That's a never-ending task.

Anyway. Today I found three of the four men who were always on my mom's dresser. Not sure why the fourth picture wasn't with these three. The missing one is of her dad. Perhaps it will surface eventually.

The very same dresser was also handy, now residing in my dining room. Just for you, I cleared part of the top and put the pictures back where they belong. Lots of reflections, but I wanted to put them in their "proper" context just for one minute.



It looks to me as if all the pictures were taken when the men were about the same ages, but not the same years, because they are from different generations.

The picture on the far left is my dad, Ray F. Leary. It looks to me as if he might have been college age (he went to Cornell but did not graduate). That would make it about 1922, and probably the oldest of the pictures.


In the middle is dad's son, John S. Leary. As a child looking at that picture he always looked to me like a grownup. Looking at the picture now, he seems more like a high school student. That places the year around 1944, the newest of the pictures.


On the far right is Mom's brother, Merrill F. Rowe, "Jacques." He was killed in 1933 at age 26. I'm guessing college age as well for this shot. That would put it around 1929.


Of course none of these pictures is labeled. At least I'm going to get that done before they are relegated back to a box. Two of the three would need new frames to display them (hanger/stander broken) and it seems wrong somehow to change the frames they've been in for my entire lifetime.

Another interesting mystery was also uncovered. Tucked in the frame of Jacques' picture was a cancelled check written by his father (the missing picture) Howard M. Rowe, to him in May of 1933 for $350.00 Pretty big bucks for back then. Wonder what it was for!

	See Who's Important See Passages See Ray F. Leary
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Who's Important? and a Family Mystery

 
While sorting some things today, I came across a leather 4-fold picture frame that I don't recall ever seeing before.



Judging from the age and three of the pictures that were in it, I'm sure it was my grandmother's. That said, there's a bit of a mystery...

The far left space has a picture of "Aunt Lucy." She's no relation at all, but was a friend of Granny's. She went on several vacations with us. To me, as a child, she was sort of a non-person. Just an adult who showed up for various things. Right at the moment, I can't even remember her last name. Clearly, she was very important to Granny. I never realized how much, if this collection of pictures means anything.

The next slot is filled with a photo of my grandfather, Granny's husband, Howard Meade Rowe. I never knew him. He died before I was born.

Next is, well... me. I'm about two. This was one of a set of professional photos that Granny had taken. There is another one that ended up being framed with Granny, Mom and me together (same dress, age, etc). I don't think I've ever seen this one of me alone.

Now comes the mystery part. Who was in the fourth frame? Clearly, there is a picture there of my mother. But it was not put there by Granny, and it doesn't fit the frame. The picture was taken after Granny was no longer living on her own. I'll show you the picture of my mom, in a minute. My guess is there was a picture there of "Jacques." (just say Jack- Granny had pretensions) Here's why I think that.

First of all, Granny never made any bones about it that Jacques and I were her favorites. She made a point of snubbing my mom regularly. Secondly, behind the too-small-for-the-frame photo is a letter written by Jacques that I've never seen before. Obviously something Granny really treasured. I'll treasure it too. Jacques (Merrill Fisher Rowe) was killed in a terrible accident when he was 26. We don't have many mementos of his life. Granny (her writing) has dated this 8/4/15. That's 1915. Jacques would have been eight. (In some ways, it's a little creepy to find something written a century ago, by an uncle I never knew.)

On the front it says "Dear Father, Uncle Lew put a saddle on Kate and I rode her around the yard. Love, Merrill."

On the reverse is a picture of a horse with a rider. It's labeled "Kate and me."

I think that Mom found this picture set at some point and removed the photo of Jacques. I know that she loved him dearly, but was naturally always hurt at Granny's favoritism. She couldn't keep it out of her voice when family topics arose. Then, she added her own picture, and three other letters to that last space. Those letters are two short notes I wrote to her, long after I was married and raising kids. Also, there is a thank-you note to her from Steve, our youngest, for a birthday gift. I would only classify one of those letters as anything significant, so I'm not sure why Mom chose to stash them there. She kept all my other letters, but I discovered them in plain manilla envelopes, long ago.

If Mom sort of commandeered the frame for people she cared about, I'm not sure why she left the photo of Aunt Lucy. I never had any sense of closeness between the two of them.

Do you think I'll come across a loose picture of Jacques that would fit this frame somewhere?

Anyway, here's Mom. Photo taken around 1965, my best guess anyway.

Families can be strange things, can't they?

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